page 4
daily nebraskan
Wednesday, december 6, 1978
opinioneditorial
Tenth floor window no problem-solver, people may be
Often it's a matter of priorities.
Often these priorities are foisted
upon the student by the parents. It's
a rather sad commentary on the
American drive to succeed that some
students choose death over failure.
Failure can often be the greatest
teacher. Death doesn't teach any
thing, except possibly, the high value
of life.
One must have a sane, sensible
perspective in a world of grade point
averages, long hours, high tuitions,
a high degree of academic competi
tion and a tight job market. There
are great pressures put upon students
in this situation and it isn't surprising
that some of them crack under it.
The key to surviving the academic
jungle is the ability to sit back oc
casionally despite the deadlines and
pressures and take a calm, slow look
at the whole picture. Often, when
totally involved in this kind of fran
tic, day-to-day . battle called higher
education, it's hard to see the forest
for the trees.
If, in order to sit back, it is neces
sary to seek professional help, there's
no shame in it. Everyone needs help
from time to time and there's ab
solutely nothing wrong with asking
for it. Believe it or not there are
actually people whose job it is to
help others.
A view of this kind of help shared
by many, is that other people some
times need it but not you or me.
What we tend to forget is that we are
all you's and me's.
If you are in the throes of an end-of-the-semester
panic, if you're
afraid Dad's going to disown you if
your GPA drops below 3.5, if you
think the open window in your
tenth-floor room looks more inviting
than going home for Christmas,
you've lost the proper perspective.
It's time to sit back and take a
breather-and perhaps get some help.
On this campus there's help at the
Health Center and any of the campus
ministries. Help rarely killed anyone.
Lack of it seems to be doing a pretty
good job.
Psychologists tell us that college
and university students figure prom
inently in suicide statistics.
Furthermore, they say, this is the
time of year when these students
make that fatal decision. It seems to
be a combination of fear of failure,
academic pressures, peer pressures
-and loneliness in the face of a holi
day season away from home.
New York Times is knocked down a notch 'for fun'
It hit the stands on Monday, Oct. 23 in
the middle of a strike which closed New
York's three major daily newspapers.
It looked strangely similar to the
nation's leading newspaper, the type was
the same, the layout looked so real.
But something was wrong.
The famous motto had changed from
"all the news that is fit to print" to "all
the news not fit to print."
The price went up from 20 to 95 cents.
And the flag contained an extra word.
It was "Not the New York Times."
.kent wolgamott
The only edition of the paper led with a
story headlined "Pope Dies Yet Again;
Reign Is Briefest Ever, Cardinals Return
From Airport."
Not the New York Times correspondent
R. W. Papple, Jr. wrote from Rome that
Pope John Paul John Paul I died while ad
ministering the Papal benediction, only
serving 19 minutes as Pope, the briefest
reign ever.
Stretched stories
Other page one stories included the
collapse of the Queensboro Bridge during
a marathon because of too many runners;
the confusion of New York's social season
as chic disco Studio 54 burned to the
ground and a dispatch from San Francisco
accompanied by a nose chart on the rising
usage of cocaine.
Unfortunately, the new paper was ill
fated as only one issue reached newsstands.
Actually, the Not the New York Times
was a gift by New York's literary crowd
to those in the world who missed their
Times as the newspaper strike dragged on.
It also is an excellent satire on the hand
that feeds America's news.
A copy of the infamous gazette found
its way into my mailbox last week and pro
vided hours of entertainment as Tom
Wicker became Tom Wacker and wrote
about the ERA, James Rest gave us a
report from Asia Minor and Dead Smith
wrote about the Knicks and Rangers.
This sort of satire is healthy and fun and
is practiced by this newspaper on occasion.
When it is done by people like Carl
Bernstein, Nora Ephron and P. J. O'Rourke
it reaches its highest andor lowest level.
No message
There is no great social message in the
Not the New York Times, and it has no
purpose except to entertain and perhaps to
knock The New York Times down a notch
or two.
There are plans in the works to market
the paper nationally so it may appear in
bookstores or copies can be found floating
around.
Last week, the Supreme Court denied
certiorari to Myron Farber and the New
York Times in their appeal of contempt
convictions from New Jersey.
In refusing to hear the case, the court
stood by its earlier decision in the Branz
burg case which said a constitutionally
protected newsman's privilege does not
exist.
This in itself is not troubling, as the
press has been working under Branzburg.
The problem with the Farber case is that
it involves a part of the Branzburg decision
which said states can establish shield laws
to protect reporters from being forced
to reveal their sources.
New Jersey has such a law and it was a
key part of Farber's defense, but the court
refused to hear the case, seemingly just
ifying judicial ignorance of shield laws
across the nation.
It was unfortunate the court did not
choose to hear the case. We can only hope
it will change its mind on later appeals.
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Parents who give up children to adoption fight for rights
Washington-The whole time I was talk
ing with Virginia, I was thinking about
Cynthia. Not that you would see any simi
larities on the surface.
Virginia, 43 and white, has a good job
with the government, lives with her hus
band in a good home in a prestigious neigh
borhood. She appears to be doing okay.
Cynthia, 20, black and unmarried, was
barely a certified adult when I spoke with
her a year and a half ago. She and her
three children were living on $314 a month
in public assistance.
What Cynthia and Virginia have in
common is their dismay at the public
attitude toward people who surrender their
children for adoption. They want the rules
changed.
When I met her, Cynthia was trying to
find a lawyer to help her locate her first
child a daughter who would be seven
now who had been placed for adoption.
Principle her concern
Virginia is more concerned with the
principle than the practical effect of the
law, having on her own, located all four of
her chfleren after a search of just a few
months.
"When I talk about the rights of birth
parents," she told me, "you may get the
impression that I was 14 or 15 when I
surrendered my baby to a better way of
life. That's not true. I was a grown, married
woman when I surrendered four children,
aged 4 months to 5 years, when their
father deserted us."
She acknowledges that she had
profound problems at the time, emotional
and psychological as well as financial, and
she had little choice but to place her child
ren in foster care.
Adoptions coerced
But it was never her idea to have them
placed permanently for adoption, she
said. She was coerced into that after a year
of "horrendous pressures from a variety
of social workers."
William raspberry
Prior to the adoption, she said, she was
able, through social workers, to see her
children, either at their foster homes or at
the welfare agency. After the adoptions
were final, they wouldn't even tell her
where they were or how they were doing,
she said.
As the surrendering mother, she said,
she discovered she had no rights whatso
ever. She doesn't think that's right.
Outrage leads to club
And although she has since established
contact with her children, and they with
each other, her outrage over what happen
ed to her has led Virginia to join an organ
ization called Concerned United Birth
parents, Inc. (CUB), of which she is Wash
ington coordinator. (The national head
quarters is in Milford, Me., P.O. Box 573,
01757.)
"There is a big controversy over opening
court records, as more and more adopted
people are looking for their roots, their
heritage, their identity, while at the same
time, some 10 million birthparents don't
know the whereabouts of their own child
ren," she said.
"An awful lot of us are finding each
other, but others will never know if their
childre are dead or alive. (The authorities)
keep coming back to the position that we
birthparents need to be protected. But why
do I need protection? I've committed no
crime. I've given love and life.
Real purpose punishment
"No, it's not our protection they are
interested in. The only explanation that
makes snese is that they Want to punish
us."
Well, not quite the only explanation.
It is no doubt true that a lot of brithpar-ents-particularly
adolescent or college -age
mothers-would opt for a abortion
rather than place their infants for adoption
if they thought there was any chance that
their children might turn up unexpectantly
to disrupt their lives.
The adoption laws are designed to pro
tect these parents.
In addition, there must be a large
number of adoptive parents who would
have second thoughts if they had been re
quired to make their names and wherea
bouts known to the natural parents. The
laws are designed to protect them as well.
No protection needed
Virginia says no such protection is
needed. All she ever wanted, she said, was
to get to know her children and to see that
they were doing okay. In any case, they are
all adults now.
But suppose they still were children and
suppose, in Virginia's opinion, they weren't
doing okay. Could she avoid taking the
next step: trying to get her children back?
Virginia wants the law changed so that
either the natural parents or their grownup
children could get the court records of
adoption unsealed.
While the 500 members of CUB might
agree with that, there must be thousands
of settled women who would be aghast at
at the prospect that their long-suppressed
secrets might be exposed at some terribly
inopportune time.
Veto rights
One possible approach would be to give
each party to adoption -the natural par
ents, the adoptive parents and the child
veto rights as to whether the court records
will be opened, with the court itself acting
as intermediary.
Virginia won't buy that one. She be
lieves that adult children and their birth
parents have a right to know about each
other.
And if someone else's life is disrupted in
the process? "Tough," she says.
Cynthia couldn't have said it better.
(Copyright) 1978, The Washington Post
Company
